jpmc26's questions

I have a custom Windows service developed in house and deployed on a client's server. It's installed using a PowerShell command similar to the following:

$serviceUser = Get-Credential
New-Service -Name 'service-name' -DisplayName 'service-name' -Description 'This service does things' -BinaryPathName 'C:\path\to\my\service.exe' -StartupType Automatic -Credential $serviceUser

I need to back up this service's files and configuration and be able to restore them. I can back up the files myself using Robocopy or something similar, but I don't know of a way to back up the service configuration itself (credentials, start up settings, name, etc.).

If it were my decision, I'd be looking at just snapshotting the whole machine and restoring from back up. (It'd save me a lot of trouble.) Unfortunately, the client's administration has forbidden using this as the mechanism for back up/restore.

PowerShell commands or calls to executables from it are very strongly preferred, but I could do something graphical if that's the only thing available. PowerShell is the default 4.0 that comes with Windows 2012.

How can I back up/restore a Windows service?

I've found several questions about how to suppress warnings like this:

Security Warning Run only scripts that you trust. While scripts from the Internet can be useful, this script can potentially harm your computer. Do you want to run .\myscript.ps1? [D] Do not run [R] Run once [S] Suspend [?] Help (default is "D"):

But I have the reverse problem. It has mysteriously disappeared, and I want it back. I don't have full control over the machine, so it's possible something got changed without my knowing. My Execution Policy is currently set to Restricted, but I see no warning when running powershell -ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted -File .\myscript.ps1, even though I had seen it regularly before.

Why do I want it back?

The machine in question is a test machine provided by a client. Further up the chain (in the staging and production environments), I expect this warning to show up, so I want my test machine to be configured so that I get it there as well. Well, normally, at least. My work will generally just require answering yes or suppressing it, but for testing purposes, I want the test machine as much like the stage and production machines as possible.

I'd at least like to know what changed so I can find out if it would affect staging and production, so any suggestions about what that might be would help.